About sixty million stimulus payments were made this week. House Ways and Means Chair Richard Neal of Massachusetts laid out the expected timeline for Economic Stimulus Payments. The first wave was issued to tax filers who included personal direct deposit information on their return. A second wave of direct deposits will be attempted at the end of the month. The targeted group in the second wave is the non-filers whose direct deposit information is on record with the US Treasury, primarily Social Security benefits recipients.

The third phase is gradually released. IRS will begin to issue paper checks beginning in May at the rate of five million checks per week to what it assumes are the remaining 110 million taxpayers. The first round of checks will go to the lowest AGI taxpayers. The last issuance will ripple at the end of September. Included in this third segment are the 21 million rapid anticipation refund filers. These are taxpayers who buy a bank account or fixed amount debit card from the tax preparer to receive a portion of their annual refund. Economic Stimulus payments will not be made on a RAL account or debit card. (The Mef schematics include a RAL indicator.)

Not included in the automated stimulus give-away are non-filers who do not receive social security benefits by direct deposits and do not file tax returns. By mid-May, the IRS will post on its website a secure portal that will allow citizens to register, update direct deposit information and check on their stimulus status.